Pop Champagne…why?

Randomly considering tweaking this blog a little to make it more graphic, but a part of me does not want to. I like to keep this clean and minimalist. For pictures, quotes and other randoms, see http://adunola.tumblr.com/

Yesterday, I was leafing through my intelligent life magazine and I always love the ads, I like the attention to detail, for example there was this ad on Dom Perignon, I loved the cut and etchings on the bottle, the colours used and the entire page just had this feel of class and good taste. All very well. I guess the bottle of champagne registered somewhere in my psyche.

I went for my morning run today. Well okay it was more like mid-day run as I went to bed quite late last night and so woke up not very early; but I was determined to go running, and running I went. I have an interesting running playlist on my ipod. I say it is interesting because it is a combination of sorts, going from the instrumental (Omar Bashir’s oud is always delightful) to the old (Janet Jackson’s Pleasure Principle, anyone), to the rock (Afterlife Avenged Sevenfold), to the rap/rnb music combo (Pop Champagne by movado). Actually I am not quite sure what genre Pop Champagne falls under but there you go.

For the first time ever, and I have had this track for quite a while, I was paying close attention to the lyrics. Think it was more to do with being at the end of my 45minutes run and needing to concentrate and focus, seeing as other distractions (PhD on Africa/Nigeria or global?, shopping list, how to be a better person, to-do list, etc) were not working. I decided to concentrate on the lyrics to the song. And it made so much sense finally.

The reason is because I have been wondering why in Nigeria there is a preoccupation with popping champagne at parties and clubs; and also where the trend came from. I understand the need to flaunt wealth, okay maybe I don’t but to each his own, but I don’t understand the need to pop bottles of champagne as a marker of a particular status. I mean, to impress your boys, attract girls, but champagne is not for that sort of consumption. It should be celebratory and consumed in a way that appreciates the delicacy with which it has been made.

Anyways, listening to Movado’s Pop Champagne remix made me realise the trend. So it is to ‘copy’ American RnB stars who sing about popping champagne and having champagne rain in the club as a way to impress their friends and attract girls.

And apparently it works. I guess the makers of Moet & Chandon, Veuve clicquot and Dom Perignon must be happy that they have such a huge market in Nigeria, even if the style of consumption doesn’t quite fit with the general champagne etiquette.

I guess we all learn everyday. I constantly learn that different elements in the world, hitherto and seemingly unrelated – Dom Perignon ad in The Economist, Intelligent life; Adun’s morning run, Movado, Nigerian clubs – can have common strands, “popping champagne”. And it is in this seeming randomness that we constantly experience life.

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